Working Out the Date of Easter Day. In the Gregorian Calendar, Easter can be on the dates from March 22nd to April 25th. The next time it will be on March 22nd (as early as it can be), will be in the year 2285. Easter last occurred on March 22nd in 1818! (However, in Orthodox churches in 2010 Easter was on March 22nd.

• Future Easter Dates Through 2050

Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent, falls on a different date each year. How is the date of Ash Wednesday determined?

There are two factors that determine the date of Ash Wednesday. The first is the date of Easter. Easter Sunday is a moveable feast, which can occur as early as March 22 and as late as April 25.

The second factor is the length of Lent. From the earliest days of the Church, Christians have desired to prepare for the celebration of Christ's Resurrection at Easter through a period of fasting and prayer that mirrors the 40 days that Christ spent in the desert at the beginning of His ministry. But there was one little hitch, however. Because Sunday is the day of Christ's Resurrection, from the time of the Apostles on fasting has been forbidden on Sunday.

No Fasting on Sundays

While the Lenten fast is 40 days, Sundays are not included in the count, since they are days of feasting and not fasting. Therefore, in order to have a full 40 days of fasting before Easter, we have to count backward from Holy Saturday, while skipping every Sunday. When we do that, we find that we end up skipping six Sundays before we reach a count of 40 days, so Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent, falls 46 days before Easter every year—40 days plus the six Sundays.

How to Calculate the Date of Ash Wednesday

While this may all sound rather complicated, the date of Ash Wednesday is actually easily calculated. Simply take the date of Easter for any given year and subtract 46 days. Or, to make it even easier, count backward six weeks from the date of Easter to get the date of the First Sunday of Lent; Ash Wednesday is the Wednesday before the First Sunday of Lent. Six weeks is 42 days; Wednesday through Saturday are another four days, which gives you 46 days.

This is a list of dates for Easter. The Easter dates also affect when Ash Wednesday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday, Feast of the Ascension and Pentecost occur. Easter may occur on different dates in the Gregorian Calendar and the Julian Calendar. The accompanying table provides both sets of dates, for recent decades and forthcoming years — see the computus article for more details on the calculation.

• 1Earliest Easter
• 2Latest Easter

Earliest Easter[edit]

Western (Gregorian)[edit]

In 1818 the Paschal Full Moon fell on Saturday, March 21 (the equinox). Therefore, the following day, March 22, was Easter. It will not fall as early again until 2285, a span of 467 years. The next earliest Easter between 1818 and 2285 (March 23) occurred in 1845, 1856, 1913 and 2008, and will occur again in 2160—an 11, 57, 95 and 152-year gap, respectively. Easter last occurred on March 24 in 1940 and will not occur on that day until 2391, a 451-year gap.

Orthodox (Julian)[edit]

The earliest dates for Easter in the Eastern Orthodox Church between 1875 and 2099 are April 4, 1915 and April 4, 2010 (Gregorian). Both dates are equivalent to March 22 in the Julian Calendar.

Latest Easter[edit]

Future Easter Dates Through 2050

Western (Gregorian)[edit]

In 1943 Easter fell on Sunday, April 25. The last ecclesiastical full moon preceding the Paschal did not occur until Saturday, March 20; prior to March 21, the fixed date to which the vernal equinox is assigned for the purposes of the computus, meaning the Paschal full moon did not happen until Sunday, April 18. Consequently, Easter was the following Sunday (April 25). Easter will not fall as late again until 2038—a span of 95 years. The second latest date for Easter, April 24, occurred in 2011. The last time this occurred was in 1859 and will not happen again until 2095—spans of 152 and 84 years. However between 5121 and 6482, Easter will be no later than April 24.^{[citation needed]}

Orthodox (Julian)[edit]

The latest dates for Orthodox Easter between 1875 and 2099 are May 8, 1983, and May 8, 2078 (Gregorian). Both dates are equivalent to April 25 in the Julian Calendar. Orthodox Easter has never fallen on Gregorian May 7 yet; it will happen in 2051 unless these churches change to another calendar.

Western and Orthodox Easter on the same date[edit]

Despite using calendars that are apart by 13 days, Easter 2014 fell on the same date. According to the Western (Gregorian) calendar, the first Paschal Full Moon after the Spring Equinox (March 20) fell on Monday, April 14, 2014. The following Sunday, April 20, was, therefore, Easter Day.

According to the Orthodox (Julian) calendar (which is 13 days behind the Gregorian calendar), the Spring Equinox also falls on March 21. However, in the Gregorian Calendar, this is April 3. The first Orthodox Full Moon after the Equinox falls on (Julian) Tuesday, April 2, 2014 (Gregorian April 15). The following Sunday, (Julian) April 7, is, therefore, Easter Day (Gregorian April 20).

Range of dates for Western and Orthodox Easter[edit]

Both calendars (Gregorian and Julian) calculate Easter as falling on dates between March 22 and April 25 on their calendars. However, because of the 13-day difference, any member of an Orthodox church would observe that the Western Easter falls between March 10 and April 12 on the Julian calendar. Conversely, any member of a Western church would observe that Orthodox Easter falls between April 4 and May 8 on the Gregorian calendar.

Beginning March 14, 2100 (February 29, 2100, in the Julian Calendar), the difference between the Julian and Gregorian calendars will increase to 14 days.

Public holidays[edit]

In Hungary, Kenya, the United Kingdom (except Scotland), Australia, South Africa, Germany, Serbia, Switzerland and New Zealand, Easter has two public holidays, Good Friday and Easter Monday, making a four-day weekend. The moveable date of Easter sometimes brings it into conflict with other, fixed, public holidays.

• In the United Kingdom in 2000 and 2011, the May Day bank holiday was one week after Easter Monday, causing there to be three consecutive weeks with a bank holiday. (In Scotland this did not occur as Easter Monday is not a bank holiday.) In 2011, a bank holiday was declared on Friday 29 April for the wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton;^[1] consequently there were four bank holidays within three consecutive calendar weeks (including two in one week), creating two consecutive four-day weekends (Friday 22 – Monday 25 April and Friday 29 April – Monday 2 May), with a three-day working week in between (Tuesday 26 – Thursday 28 April).
• In Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland in 2008, Saint Patrick's Day (Monday 17 March) fell six days before Easter (Sunday 23 March), creating a three-day week (Tuesday 18 – Thursday 20 March). This will next happen in 2035, when Saint Patrick's Day falls on Saturday, so the public holiday is moved forward to the following Monday 19 March, again six days before Easter.
  • In the Catholicliturgical calendar, saints' feasts are not observed when they fall during Holy Week; this caused Saint Patrick not to appear in the liturgical calendar for 2008; 17 March was simply celebrated as Holy Monday. In Ireland, the Church chose to celebrate Saint Patrick on Saturday 15 March instead.^[2]
• In Australia and New Zealand, ANZAC Day is a public holiday on 25 April. In 2000 and 2011, this created a five-day weekend over Easter: in 2000, Easter Monday fell on 24 April, with the following Tuesday, 25 April, then being ANZAC Day; in 2011, ANZAC Day and Easter Monday coincided on Monday 25 April, which led to a substitute public holiday being declared for Tuesday 26 April.^[3] In 2003 and 2014, ANZAC Day fell on the Friday after Easter, and in 2019 it fell on the Thursday after Easter, and in 2038 it will fall on Easter Sunday; the consequence is three-day working weeks immediately following the Easter weekend.

• Easter is not a federal holiday in the United States. In North Carolina, however, it was a public holiday from 1935 to 1987.^[4]

• In Norway Easter is celebrated with public holidays on the Thursday and Good Friday before, and Easter Monday, but schools and businesses traditionally have a half-day on the Wednesday as well.

References[edit]

1. ^'Royal Wedding Bank Holiday in the United Kingdom'.
2. ^'Irish bishops move St. Patrick's Day 2008 over conflict with Holy Week'. Catholic News Agency. July 19, 2007. Retrieved April 1, 2018.
3. ^https://www.officeholidays.com/countries/australia/2011.php
4. ^'Easter Monday in the United States'. TimeandDate.com. Retrieved October 25, 2016.

External links[edit]

• http://tlarsen2.tripod.com/thomaslarsen/easterdates.html – has a much larger list of dates
• A chronology since Council Nicaea 'Date of Easter Sunday' Father Kevin Michael Laughery, as observed by Western Christians since A.D. 326 (last updated Tuesday, November 4, 2008)
• Interactive calculator generates historical feast dates in Julian calendar prior to 1582 Gregorian reforms